Entertainment

ReadBurner: Google Shared Items Memetracker

Readburner is a site that has been playing at the edges of my feeds for several weeks now. I think I vaguely remember submitting my linkblog to a developer a month or so ago. He had said he needed a pile of linkblog submissions while he worked on an experimental aggregator based around Google's Shared Item functionality. I saw a shared item in one or two of the linkblogs I subscribe to that ended up pointing back to a directory on an Amazon EC2 server.

Then Louis Gray wrote a couplearticles, letting the cat out of the bag that there was indeed a project underway to finally fulfill the longstanding wishes of MG Siegler (and a great number of other folks like me who are avid Google Reader users). Yes, Virginia, there is a Google Shared Items memetracker, and its name is ReadBurner.

Keep in mind that this project is so darn Alpha that it didn't even have a domain name up until earlier today, but this thing works, and works pretty darn well. This site does more or less what Mario Romero's application Feedheads does on Facebook, but on the general platform of the web, and with a definite 'memetracker' look and feel. It is currently seeded with the linkblogs of several thought leaders in the tech blogging community, such as Louis Gray, MG Siegler, Chris Brogan,Robert Scoble, and others (although my linkblog is conspicuously absent). The full list of linkblogs is currently available in the app's tag cloud.

The site has a few different views on how to track what's popular amongst the Google Reader crowd: Currently Popular, Most Recent, Popular This Week, Most Popular All Time. Earlier today, there was a problem with duplicate items showing up in the Currently Popular view, but aside from that, from where I'm sitting, the site appears to be technically solid.

Despite this, Alexander Marktl, the sole programmer and owner of ReadBurner, claims that the project is still extremely alpha, and that "there's no real design on it."

I spoke with Marktl, earlier tonight by way of Facebook. By day, he works over a Qoove, a plain and simple invoicing solution based in Vienna, Austria. By night, though, he's been working on ReadBurner.

"I still have to figure out the best way to present the content," he told me. "I'm also open for help on the site, since it's currently just me doing the site."

The only thing I can think of that it may lack at the moment is RSS feeds of the different lists. Still, it's a great project, something that needed to be done by the Google Reader team, and something that should have great success ahead of it.

Mashable
is a global, multi-platform media and entertainment company. Powered by its own proprietary technology, Mashable is the go-to source for tech, digital culture and entertainment content for its dedicated and influential audience around the globe.